Windows to the Soul
by JantoJones
Summary: Illya is an unwitting victim of a fantastical Thrush experiment.


Napoleon tried not to worry as he waited for his partner. The satrapy had been evacuated, and Solo had retrieved the file they had been sent for. All that remained was for Illya to work his explosives magic and they could be away. As usual, the Russian seemed to be taking longer than necessary. To pass the time, Solo flicked through the pages of the file. It seemed to Napoleon that he was reading pure science fiction. The experiments detailed within the file were simply inconceivable. He was startled from his reading by a loud explosion.

Napoleon's worry levels immediately escalated. He'd expected the explosion, but not until after Illya had left the building. He allowed a little time for things to settle before beginning a search for his partner. After twenty minutes of staving off panic, Napoleon caught a glimpse of an arm poking from the rubble. He recognised the thin gold band on the large hand as Illya's. Solo hardly dared breathe as he felt for pulse. Relief flooded though him as he found it, strong and steady. Without any further hesitation, Napoleon began to remove the debris from his friend. Thankfully, this didn't take too long.

"Hey buddy," he said, as he patted Illya's cheek. "Are you still with me?"

After a few seconds the Russian stirred. Groaning loudly he opened his eyes, and then frowned as he watched the expression on Napoleon's face change from relief to concern.

"Napoleon?" he asked. "Is there something wrong with me?"

"Err . . . no. At least, I don't think so," Napoleon stumbled; having no idea how to tell Illya what had happened. "Can you move?"

"Yes," Kuryakin asserted. "But you are lying to me."

"Yes. Yes I am," Solo admitted. "But I think it's best you see for yourself."

Napoleon helped his partner to his feet, but refused to say what was wrong. He told Illya to 'just go and look in the car's mirror'. The tone in his partner's voice, and the expression on his face, was enough to spur Illya into action, and he practically sprinted to their car. He barely noticed the bruises and twinges which had been caused by the collapsing building. Looking in the mirror Illya immediately saw what had shocked Napoleon.

"My eyes brown!" he gasped. "Why are my eyes brown? How?"

"I'm not sure, Tovarisch," Solo answered. "But this file I took details the experiments Thrush have been conducting to do just that."

"Why?" Illya asked. "What purpose does it serve?"

"Who knows," Napoleon replied. "All I'm interested in right now is getting you back to medical and seeing if this can be reversed."

It's a puzzler," stated Dr Leonard Barrie, after examining Illya's eyes. "Other than the colour, your eyes are the same as they were."

"Is there nothing you can do?" Illya asked.

"Without knowing what happened, no," the doctor told him regretfully.

Illya furrowed his eyebrows. While it wasn't exactly life-threatening, it was probably going to be impossible to live with. The simple act of walking the corridors of HQ would feel the same as it did when he'd first arrived in New York. This time, however, rather than whispered conversations about his nationality, it would be whispered conversations about the colour of his eyes. Worse than that, now that people knew him and were comfortable around him, they would no doubt ask him about it outright.

"My advice is to go home," Dr Barrie continued, almost sensing Illya's concerns. "Once you've given your report to Mr Waverly of course. I'll liaise with the research department in the mean-time."

Illya slipped on his sunglasses and headed up to Mr Waverly's office. No-one made comment about his eyewear as they were all assumed that he was suffering from another headache, for which he often wore sunglasses or his tinted spectacles.

Napoleon was seated at the Old Man's conference table when entered. Nodding a greeting to the two men, Illya sat down beside his partner. He reached up to remove the sunglasses, but was stopped by the chief.

"If you feel more comfortable with them on, then I have no objection," Waverly told hm. "Mr Solo has apprised me of the situation, and Dr Barrie has just telephoned to say he's sending you home."

"Thank you, Sir.

"I'm authorising a one day leave," Mr Waverly continued. "I can't be doing with having you missing for too long when you're perfectly fit. Of course, if the research team come up with an answer before that time is up, then you will need to return. I doubt I would need to make that an order."

After giving his part of the verbal report to Mr Waverly, Illya took his leave. Napoleon quickly followed.

"Want some company?" he asked. "I can take an hour or two for lunch if you fancy it."

Illya shook his head, but thanked his friend for his offer.

"I've got some reading to catch up on," he said, before walking away.

Watching Illya go, Napoleon knew he would be fine in the long run, but couldn't help but be concerned.

Illya had always claimed not to be overly concerned with his appearance but, as he stared into his bathroom mirror, he knew he had been lying to himself. While he wasn't as obsessed with his looks as Napoleon was with his, Illya knew the power his blue eyes held. They could freeze an enemy, or melt a heart. They could look deep and soulful, or they could be a steel barrier. Illya had nothing against brown eyes per se, they seemed to work well for Napoleon after all, but he always believed blue eyes to be the most expressive.

More than that, Illya's eyes were the last remaining link to his mother. His nose and mouth were inherited from his father, but the shape and intensity of his eyes were very much from his Mama. In a strange way, it felt to him as though he had lost a little more of his memory of her. It saddened him but, ever the pragmatist, he pushed those feelings aside. At that moment there was no way to change the situation, so there was little point in dwelling on it.

Knowing his mind would keep drifting to his eyes, Illya decided to go out for a while. He needed a few groceries so he would take the opportunity to go and get them. This unfortunately turned out to be a bad decision.

Illya was halfway to his preferred store when a car screeched to a halt beside him. The rear door opened and a gun was pointed at him from within. Without a word being said, Illya obeyed the gunman's gesture for him to get in. This wasn't the first time he had been snatched off the street and he'd learned from experience to just go with it. Surreptitiously he activated combined distress signal and tracker device embedded in his watch.

Within half an hour, Illya was chained to an uncomfortable wooden chair and was having questions fired at him from the two men who had taken him. As was his usual response, he said nothing in return. He had no idea who the men were, though he suspected Thrush, but that didn't matter. He wouldn't tell them anything.

"Hold on, Jim," said the one who had been driving the car. "I thought Kuryakin had blue eyes. He's known for 'em."

"Don't be an idiot, Al," Jim replied tersely. "He's obviously wearing coloured contact lenses."

"Why?"

"We've obviously grabbed him just as he was heading out on an assignment."

Realising that he had an opportunity, Illya seized hold of the confusion and added to it.

"I am not wearing contact lenses," he told them, making his accent sound more English. "My eyes really are brown."

The one called Jim grabbed a handful of Illya's hair and pulled his head back. With his other hand, he forced his eye fully open and peered in closely.

"I think he's telling the truth."

While Jim held him, Al carefully placed his finger against his captive's eyeball and felt for a lens. Illya tried to blink the intrusion away but, with his eyelids being held open, he was helpless. Throughout his career, he had been subjected to many uncomfortable and painful tortures, but none of them came close to have a fingertip touching his eyeball. He would have preferred a whipping to that.

"He definitely isn't wearing lenses," Al confirmed, "But I'm sure it's Kuryakin."

"How has he changed his eye colour?"

"It must be new U.N.C.L.E. discovery," Al replied to Jim's question. "That will be for our scientists to discover. I guess we'd better not physically 'question' him until the eye thing is solved."

Illya was not a religious man, but he found himself thanking whatever universal force caused the various Thrush factions to be jealously covetous of their discoveries. This pair obviously had no idea that the colour change was down to their side. Illya was also extremely relieved to realise that any torture which was coming his way had been postponed. Not that it would have lasted too long if his luck held. Hopefully HQ would have picked up his distress signal and his rescuers would arrive shortly.

For a further ten minutes, Illya refused to answer any of the questions Jim and Al bombarded him with. A few times he explained that he wasn't this Kuryakin they thought he was, but this was ignored. Thankfully his torment was ended when Napoleon burst into the room, along with three other agents.

"You know Illya," said Solo, as he released his partner. "When you're given time off, you're supposed to take that time off. You're not meant to go looking for Thrushies."

Illya glared at the American. It was rare for glare to have an effect on Napoleon as it was these days but, without the ice in Illya's eyes, it was even less effective.

It was another three days before the research team found a solution to Illya's Dilemma. They had ascertained that, when the Thrush facility had been demolished, several chemicals had been released. As was detailed in the files Napoleon had taken, the chemicals had formed a gas, which Illya had inadvertently breathed in.

"We've reverse engineered the gas," the lead researcher, Bill Davies, told him. "And come up with an antidote gas. Hopefully."

Illya raised an eyebrow at the word 'hopefully', but said nothing. After three days of everyone asking him about his eyes, he was ready to try anything. Accepting the face mask from Dr Davies, Illya took a deep breath.

"How long will it take?" he asked.

"It's starting already," Davies told him, handing him a mirror.

Illya watched in fascination as the outer edge of his iris lightened and became the blue he knew so well. The brown seemed to bleed away into his pupil as his own eyes came back to him. It was a relief to be back to normal but, more importantly, he could once again see his Mama in his eyes.

"Thank you, Bill, he said, with genuine gratitude. "Is there any chance of it not holding?"

"I believe it will remain stable. If not, we'll deal with it."

Illya thank Davies a second time, before heading off to meet up with Napoleon in their office.

"Old blue eyes is back," Solo quipped as Illya entered. "I tried reading the file, but I couldn't make head nor tail of how the whole thing worked."

"Me neither, my friend," Illya replied. "Nor do I understand the purpose of it. Although, it confused my captor's long enough to prevent a torture session."

"Well, it's all over now," Napoleon stated. "I can imagine all the ladies will be pleased by the return of their blue eyed baby."

The ice and steel glower, for which Illya was well known, appeared on his face. For the first time in a long time, it made Napoleon shiver.


End file.
